A statue of Ethiopia’s late emperor Haile Selassie in central London has been smashed.
Witnesses say the incident took place in Cannizaro Park on Tuesday by a group of people believed to be from Ethiopia and apparently sympathetic to the protest movement in their homeland since the killing of famed singer Hachalu Hundessa on Monday.
Protesters have been taking to the streets in Ethiopia’s Oromia region angry over Hundessa’s assassination, the motive for which is still unknown.
The smashed bust was erected in Wimbledon where Haile Selassie had lived in exile following the occupation of Ethiopia by Italy in the mid 1930s.
In Ethiopia, a statue of Selassie’s father Prince Ras Makonnen Wolde Mikael in the eastern city of Harar was recently destroyed by protesters.
WN/as/APA